There are many pros and Cons when it comes to wearing uniforms in school. I personally am for School Uniforms but I certainly very understand of the cons of wearing them. In this article I will mainly be focusing on the Pros of School Uniforms and at a later date, I will post another article discussing the cons.
Equality in Dress
Bill Clinton, the Former President of the United States said at one point that mandatory school uniforms open up the possibility that “young people will learn to evaluate themselves by what they are on the inside, instead of what they’re wearing on the outside.” For students in the public school system, the wealth disparity is very high among students and you can easily tell the “rich” kids from the “poor” kids. By wearing the same clothing, it makes it difficult for students to tell if another student is poor or rich and can help less-wealthy students from feeling inferior to their better dressed peers. Wearing uniforms can also lift the pressure from the parents because there will be less of a chance that they will have to pay for the designer clothing, but this could be compromised if the school doesn’t require you to go to a specific vendor.
Academic Performance Increased
Many educators and parents firmly believe that students that are required to wear a uniform to school and school events are allot more likely to focus on their academics instead of “I’m better than you” or “this is the gang I’m in.” It provides a sense of professionalism for students that just don’t exist in most educational institutions. Wearing uniforms at school will prepare them for the real world when the students need to wear a uniform or dress professionally at the work place.
Sociologist and K-12 experts have reported that students who wear uniforms behave more appropriately as they should in school environments. The violence rate in schools where uniforms are enforced are considerably lower than in other schools. The reason being is because students feel encouraged to follow the rules more due to the fact that they represent their school inside and outside of the school as long as they are wearing the uniform.
Social Outcomes Improved
In non-uniformed educational institutions, fashion is often the root of many social conflicts. The students tend to segregate themselves by the clothing that they wear: there are the jocks, the goths, the emos, the nerds, the cheerleaders, you get the point. With uniforms, students are forced into a neutral zone that makes social relationships easier and students have to look at who the person is and not judged by what they wear.
Affordability
Uniforms can be more affordable than having to buy an entire wardrobe of those trendy clothes. Although it is fine to have a few nice things, the kids do not have to think so much about “oh everybody has this 400 dollar pair of jeans that I don’t have. Considering that the average school in the United States spends about 6.5 hours a day, 5 days a week (almost 33 hours a week), your children are going to be seeing each other a majority of their time AT school and not as much outside of school.
